Standing on the Shoulders of Giants In the summer of 1995, I walked into a bookstore, encountered the book Design Patterns [DP] for the first time, and fell in love with patterns. I wish to thank the authors, Erich Gamma, Richard Helm (whom I still haven't met), Ralph Johnson, and John Vlissides for writing such an excellent piece of literature. The wisdom you shared in your book has helped me become a much better software designer. Somewhere around 1996, before he became famous, I met Martin Fowler at a patterns conference. It was to be the beginning of a long friendship. I doubt whether I would have written this book if Martin (and his colleagues, Kent Beck, William Opdyke, John Brant, and Don Roberts) had not written the classic book Refactoring [F]. Like Design Patterns, Refactoring utterly changed the way I approach software design. My writings in this book could only have happened because of the hard work of the authors of Design Patterns and Refactoring. I can't thank you all enough for your great books. |
